Marble Art                

The monument most universally identifiable with the Mughal emperors is the Taj Mahal, built as a mausoleum for the wife of Shah Jahan, Mumtaz Mahal, who died giving birth to her fourteenth child in 1631. It took fourteen years to complete and is now one of the most renowned buildings in the world.

Shah Jahan was the great architectural patron of the Mughal dynasty. Drawing on the most advanced trends of the buildings of Akbar and Jahangir, he added his own eclectic innovations to produce a style which would be imitated throughout the subcontinent for the next two centuries.

The Taj Mahal imitates the distinctive dome of its forerunner, the tomb of the emperor Humayun, and uses white marble for the entire structure. Built on a terrace overlooking the River Jumna, its beauty owes at least as much to its setting and material as to its architectural form and decoration. The faintly sparkling marble changes subtly in color according to the time of day, taking on the golden hue of dawn or the pale rose reflection of sunset, and blending in with the mist which rises from the river as night falls. It is surrounded by a garden which is criss-crossed by avenues and water channels, the smaller gardens thus created planted with vibrantly colored flowers whose scent fills the air. Inside, the tomb at ground level is matched by a cenotaph immediately above it at terrace level, directly beneath the dome.

On Shah Jahan’s death his tomb and cenotaph were placed by the side of those of his wife. All these are exquisitely inlaid with flowers of lapis lazuli, green jade, carnelian and other semi-precious stones in a technique known as pietra dura, and with black marble calligraphy. There are also panels of floral decoration carved in the marble in low relief on the dadoes inside and outside the building. White marble and pietra dura became the hallmarks of the reign, used for the tomb built by Shah Jahan at Lahore for Jahangir, and in the extensive rebuilding of Akbar’s fort.

The floral theme was certainly not unique to Shah Jahan’s reign, but until then it had never had such prominence. The formula of a flowering plant, its stem bending slightly under the weight of its blossoms, its leaves and petals curling over and, sometimes, with tiny butterflies or Chinese clouds floating around it, was infinitely adaptable. Within a rectangular frame in a vertical format, it could be applied to the page of a manuscript, a wall hanging, or carved in stoe and into a wall. A horizontal format could be produced simply by including two or more plants which could then be applied to textiles, inlaid in ivory on the sides of wooden boxes, or even applied to vessels or boxes where the decoration was confined to a central panel of decoration. This style gradually encroached on every area of courtly production, so that Shah Jahan would have been surrounded by wall-hangings, carpets, jewelled vessels and weapons, all elaborating the floral theme. From this rarefied level the style then filtered down into widespread commercial use.

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